The 12 Days of Diabetes from the Health Performance Institute!

Starting December 12 and finishing December 23, we will host a FB Live video each day. The videos will be short – 3-5 minutes – and will discuss some of the things type 2 diabetics struggle with on a daily basis. A few of the scheduled topics include discussions about food and hunger, the good news and bad news surrounding type 2 diabetes, how what you have been told about exercise is probably wrong and a lot more. See the image for a list of all 12 topics.

In each of the videos, we will discuss the topic and tell you what to do so you can improve your condition.

Type 2 diabetes is a serious condition. It’s expensive and debilitating and we don’t seem to be making progress in treating the condition. If you are serious about improving your health and making real progress in controlling your diabetes, the 12 Days of Diabetes from us is what you need.

Please join us. Everything is free and there are no strings attached. Please tag all of your friends, family members, co-workers and anyone else you think should hear this information!

Click here to view this event on Facebook. When there, scroll through and click “Going” for all 12 days of Diabetes. While the first live video is scheduled for noon on December 12, we will be hosting the live video each day at a different time, depending on scheduling. So click “Going” to stay updated on the next video times!

Sleep – How to Sleep Better Right Away!

The Academy is the program we use to help people suffering from or at-risk for type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and/or high cholesterol.

The Academy is a serious program for serious people!

For those enrolled, we are completely and totally dedicated to helping them achieve what they thought was impossible. Controlling your condition and getting off your medications is difficult. But when you are told it will never happen and you live in an environment that facilitates an unhealthy lifestyle, it makes everything exponentially worse.

The Academy is our weapon of choice in helping you through this battle. Believe me, it’s a battle. And while The Academy is the best damn weapon you can have, it’s only a weapon. The objective of The Academy is to fix the root of your problem, so the condition gets better. Our recommendations are built around this and our high success rate validates this approach.

Where we really shine with The Academy, however, is in our support. If you are serious about taking control of your condition. If you are seriously worried about the long-term consequences of poorly controlled blood pressure or blood sugar (you SHOULD be), then you need to do something different.

Following the standard advice will get you nowhere.

Being a dabbler or can-kicker will get you nowhere.

If you are serious about addressing your condition, you need to enroll in The Academy

There are two options for you here.

No tire-kickers or dabblers need apply!

Option 1: You will achieve the impossible with this option.

We will not let you fail!

This is the best, most-serious and most expensive option, but if you are serious, you will likely recoup your investment within a year, just like everyone else.

Further, we are so confident in this option, we offer a 100% Money-Back Guarantee!

With this option, you get everything included in The Academy. That means access to the website, videos, audio, materials, recipes, our private Facebook group and more. Plus, the following:

8 1-on-1 Coaching Sessions, based on the following:

Mindset: We already told you that we are a serious program for serious people. The mindset sessions prepare you to meet the challenge of living in an environment that makes it easier for you to be sick. The potential pitfalls are everywhere. We get you ready to deal with them!

Food: There will be several of these, dedicated to helping you through our food recommendations. The objective: Make is easier for you, so that success is guaranteed!

Fitness: There will be at least one of these, allowing us to coach you through the right kind of exercise program based on your current needs.

Sleep and Stress: There will be at least one of these where we coach you through our recommendations on dealing with Sleep and Stress issues. In case you didn’t know, sleep and stress are MAJOR contributors to chronic conditions and health.

In addition to the above, each week we hold a weekly group coaching call. Anyone currently in The Academy can participate. This is a way for us to all get together at once, talk, seek help and get inspiration from each other so we can continue this journey.

Note on the Coaching Calls: You get 8 of them with this option of the program. You will get to decide how they are used based on the information above. Our typical member uses 2 of them for mindset, 4 of them for food, 1 for exercise and 1 for sleep and stress. But as noted, you will have some say in how they get used.

For those daring to go it alone!

You can also get access to The Academy and everything it includes without the benefit of 1-on-1 coaching. If you are ready to go, will take the program seriously and can do it on your own, this option is perfect for you!

You get everything in The Academy – website, audio, videos, materials, recipes and more. Essentially, you get everything mentioned above without the 1-on-1 coaching.

If this is the option for you, click the button to enroll today.

Here is the video!

Click below for your option to download the slides from the presentation:

Would you like to know why our chronic disease problem is so bad? Look no further than this!

This long-worded and cumbersome title means the report was trying to answer this question: “What kind of changes in food consumption can we see over the specified period of time?” In this case, that specified period of time would be 1970 to 2014.

For a little history: The late 60’s and early 70’s was when the low-fat message started hitting Americans. The USDA published the first dietary guidelines about this time, asking Americans to eat less fat, saturated fat and red meat.

Guess what? Americans, for the most part, followed suit.

There was essentially no change in protein consumption overall – a 1% change in 40 years. Not significant. However, chicken consumption increased significantly – more than doubling during the time period. Since chicken doubled and the overall amount was essentially unchanged, this means red meat consumption went down. As instructed.

High Fructose Corn Syrup

Between 1970 and 2014, the amount of HFCS consumption increased by 8,212%, going from 0.5 pounds per person per year to 45.5 pounds. This means the average American is consuming nearly 1 pound of HFCS per week!

Grain-Based Products

Wheat and corn-based products also increased in consumption, with wheat based products increasing by 31% and corn-based products increasing by 23%.

While wheat and corn-based products look and taste different than sweets, they act the same once they reach the digestive system. In other words, bread and sugar act the same.

Look Mom, It’s a Chronic Disease Carnival!

Replacing some meat products and lowering fat consumption led to an increase in sugar and processed food consumption.

Processed foods are devoid and any nutritional value. This leaves the body hungry, craving nutrition. But people continue eating processed foods. This starts a viscous cycle.

It starts with slightly, but chronically, elevated blood sugar because insulin starts losing its ability to function efficiently. It manifests itself as pre-diabetes, high blood pressure or problems with cholesterol. Then, usually, type 2 diabetes.

Over time, a person’s health continues to deteriorate because we give them medication to change a number and do nothing to fix the problem. Chronically elevated levels of insulin and fluctuating levels of blood sugar is toxic to all tissue in the body.

The shift to this dietary approach means we have chronic diseases popping up all over the place, as if we were in a field of PEZ Dispensers.

How do we fix this problem?

It’s a two-pronged approach.

First, we need a shift from quantity of calories to quality of calories.

Earlier I mentioned that people continue eating processed food when hungry. Why do they do this? Part of it is convenience. But another important part is the thought that we can eat whatever we want, as long as we eat less. This justifies eating for convenience because it’s only the amount of calories consumed that is important.

But if forgets a serious issue: If the body is craving nutrition and we never feed it quality food, we will always be hungry. Remember, foods of convenience are devoid of nutritional value. They are just calories.

So we need more focus on quality of calories. This does not imply that calories are unimportant. It only means the quality of calories is more important. Stated another way: 1,000 calories from a grilled steak salad with vegetables and an olive oil, is not the same as 1,000 calories from Twinkies and Pepsi. Our digestive system is not the same as a bomb calorimeter.

Second, we need to focus on treating these individuals once they become diagnosed. Currently, we only managing their condition by prescribing medication to change a number. This does nothing to fix the problem. If it did, the possibility of getting off medication at some point would exist. It doesn’t (unless they take it upon themselves to do something).

Dietary policy led us here and it can lead us out

If we simply make a change in dietary policy as mentioned above, we would eliminate many of the chronic conditions anticipated in the future. We need to do this sooner rather than later. Current incidence and prevalence data for obesity and these chronic conditions suggest a tidal wave hitting our heatlhcare system soon.

That’s how we get out of this mess!

Thank you!

About Brian Sekula

Brian Sekula, PhD, is the founder and CEO of the Health Performance Institute, where they work with employers, their employees and individuals to alleviate the burden of chronic conditions by preventing diagnoses or helping individuals get off their medications. They do this by focusing on fixing the problem, rather than trying to reduce a number that is a symptom of the problem.

After a great weekend and time spent on Sunday prepping for Monday, I was ready.

Around 5:30am, this is sitting at the top of my inbox.

And what did I do?

I read the article.

And that’s what started this whole thing.

It’s like I’m screaming in a vacuum!

The article goes into detail how the state of California has been caught off guard by the soaring rates of amputations in type 2 diabetics.

On an almost daily basis, I repeat myself. “There is a tidal wave coming.” “If you think it’s bad now, wait 10 years.” “Over half the population is at risk.”

All of this happens because we do a terrible job – from a health, medical and wellness perspective – of treating the condition. We do a great job of managing the condition, but that has essentially zero impact. So statistics like this will continue and states will be “surprised.”

Managing blood sugar does nothing to improve the condition or reduce risk!

But I repeat myself.

A few of the reasons given for the rise in amputations: No clear cause (seriously, this was a response it was even in the byline of the article!); new medications; too aggressive surgeons; and the list goes on. No one blamed diabetes or how it is managed. It’s almost like they don’t know. Maybe I am screaming in a vacuum.

All emotions in one!

It’s frustrating, maddening, overwhelming and sad all at the same time.

It really doesn’t have to be this way.

Some of you know and some of you don’t. For those that don’t, you know now.

This is my mom.

This pic was taken about 2 months before her last bout of pneumonia, which was listed as her official cause of death.

She had type 2 diabetes. Did her best to control blood sugar with medication, just like every other type 2 diabetic. It didn’t seem to help, as she had kidney problems, neurological problems and more. The neurological problems led to chronic pain in her foot. Her leg had to be amputated below the knee. This pic was a few weeks after that surgery.

I’m telling you this because it doesn’t have to be this way!

She loved me. She was proud of me. But she didn’t listen to me. She thought, like millions of others, that her doctor knew best. As it turns out, not really.

She had Stage 4 or 5 CKD (depending on who answered the question). CKD is chronic kidney disease. Her kidneys weren’t working. So her body filled with fluid and dumped it into the lungs – that’s pneumonia.

Officially, she died from pneumonia.

In reality, it was type 2 diabetes. It’s what caused the kidney problems to begin with. It’s what caused the neurological pain to begin with.

It’s also why amputations in California are skyrocketing and “professionals” don’t seem to know why.

At times, it’s like an uphill battle

I get up daily to help type 2 diabetics. At times it’s like an uphill battle.

Type 2 diabetics are stressed enough as it is and stuff like this scares the hell out of them. They don’t want this. But they have nowhere to turn for helpful advice.

Everything they are told is counterproductive to improving their health. When it comes to food, they are told to eat fewer calories. This doesn’t help because they will try to follow the recommendations but their metabolic condition is so jacked up, they will end up being hungry. Then they will give into temptation. Making matters worse, they will be blamed for not having enough willpower to follow the recommendations.

They are told to burn calories with exercise.

“What should I do?” The patient asks. “Exercise” is the response. What kind of prescription is this? It’s nothing. It’s more important for type 2 diabetics to burn calories in a certain way, rather than just burning calories.

No one, it seems, is telling them the right things to do.

That’s why it feels like an uphill battle at times.

You need a plan

You can’t just wake up one day and decide to make changes. You need a plan. We have a bunch of free stuff on our Facebook page to help you get started in creating your own plan. See this post.

If all of the free stuff helps you, awesome! Your job is to tell us how well it helped you and to direct more people to that free stuff!

If you need more help, check out our type 2 diabetes coaching program – this one starts the week of October 2, 2017. The focus of this coaching program is to help you develop your plan so you can improve your condition. It focuses on food and exercise.

And, finally, if you are an employer, you have a problem with type 2 diabetes whether you know it or not. If you are self-insured (or self-funded) you need to address it. Programs you get from your consultant, broker, TPA or anywhere else, will have no impact. They are extensions of what I discuss above. If you would like to see how The Academy may help, fill out this contact form or send us an email. Happy to see if we can help.

Implanting sponges in fat tissue?

This report suggests that implanting sponges into the fat tissue of type 2 diabetics may be a helpful process, as a previous study showed positive results in rats.

You can read the article in its entirety at the link above, but I do have issues with a few of the statements. These are highlighted below.

Here is the main quote from early on in the article:

“The team found that 3 weeks after receiving polymer sponge implants in their fatty abdomens, obese mice with type 2 diabetes fed on a high-fat diet gained less weight and had lower levels of blood sugar than untreated equivalent mice.”

This outcome is what provides them “promise” of it being helpful to humans in the future.

A couple of nit-picky points on this:

A high-fat diet in “research talk” for mice is typically a higher fat rat chow, with most fat calories coming from some processed, poly-unsaturated fat like soybean oil.

They gained less weight? They had lower levels of blood sugar? Is this confirmation that elevated blood sugar leads to weight gain?

This can be confusing because the experts tell us that chronically elevated blood sugar is not associated with fat gain. But this statement seems to contradict that.

Type 2 diabetics are lazy or stupid (maybe both)

Here is one statement in the article, which clearly shows medical professionals (practitioners and researchers) have no clue how to treat or think of type 2 diabetics:

As yet there is no cure for diabetes, and current treatments depend heavily on patients’ ability to manage them. Thus, researchers are keen to discover ways to manage diabetes that do not need patients to perform daily tasks.

Come on!

Let’s look at the first part of this statement. “As yet, there is no cure for diabetes.” Of course there isn’t! As I constantly say, the approach to treating type 2 diabetics is a misnomer. It should be more appropriately called condition management. The problem is insulin resistance and the target for treatment is blood sugar. It’s as if we don’t even know what the hell we are doing.

The second part of this statement is also infuriating. “…researchers are keen to discover ways to manage diabetes that do not need patients to perform daily tasks.” It’s as if researchers think diabetics are incapable of performing a simple finger stick.

Don’t get me wrong. I understand there is a huge secondary market for strips on places like eBay. But why would a type 2 diabetic endlessly stick their finger when they are constantly told that their diabetes can’t be cured and all they have to do is take their medicine?

Yay…

Excuse me while I don’t celebrate!

the team found that compared with non-implanted mice, the PLG-implanted mice had 60 percent raised levels of glucose transporter type 4, which is a protein that helps to transport sugar from the blood into muscle cells.

So these sponges, implanted into the fat tissue, increased Glut4 levels? When this happens, your body is better at moving glucose from the blood into the muscle tissue. Do you know what else does that? Exercise! Do you know what else does that? Proper sleep! Exercise and sleep do it by improving insulin resistance. Unfortunately, these sponges have zero impact on insulin resistance.

With a zero impact on insulin resistance, these sponges will have no effect on the incidence or prevalence of type 2 diabetes. In the end, all it means is that the pool of type 2 diabetics gets larger and the costs continue to increase.

Why Bother?

What is the point? Why would anyone or why should anyone expose themselves to an implant like this if the outcome doesn’t change? Their condition will not be eliminated; it won’t even be improved. Why should or would anyone do this?

It’s just more of the same and until the target is changed, little will be done to stem the tidal wave.

Maybe we should all hope that Warren Buffett sees the light and starts putting pressure on the American Medical Association.

In the meantime, we will be here, helping diabetics improve their condition. We do that better than anyone because we understand that insulin resistance is the problem, which allows us to fix the problem.

While you are here, you should also sign up for our email list. We don’t bombard you with emails. We don’t sell your address anywhere. We just send you information, updates, specials and more. Enter your info below and get signed up!

PS. You can probably also get a free gift or two by signing up for our email list. 🙂

3 Snacks Type 2 Diabetics need to keep with them at ALL times!

No blood sugar impact snacks

Most type 2 diabetics struggle with controlling their blood sugar. Since almost all foods seem to raise their blood sugar, they also tend to stress out over what kind of snacks they can eat.

But since they also get hungry, this is a problem. So…what to eat?

Listed below are three different snacks you should have on “your person” at all times. Under most circumstances, they have a zero to minimal impact on your blood sugar, which means you should be able to eat them without worry (at least regarding your blood sugar).

Nuts

Nuts are high in fat, good fiber, vitamins and minerals. While they vary slightly – from one variety to another – in nutrient content, they are all high in fat, which means they will have minimal impact on your blood sugar. Additionally, the fat, vitamin and mineral content will help keep you full (or sated) until your next meal.

They are pretty hardy and travel well, making them an excellent snack choice for just about anyone, but type 2 diabetics in particular.

Eat them raw (our preference) or roasted. Just don’t eat them loaded with sugar or syrup or covered in chocolate (but you already knew that).

And if you happen to be allergic to nuts, seeds are good too. Pumpkin and sunflower seeds do essentially the same things!

Beef Jerky

Another snack high in protein and fat – the combination you need to keep your blood sugar from spiking.

Our preference: Buy it from a meat market or butcher shop (or make it yourself) so you know that it has been minimally processed. Another tip: If you buy from the store, check the label and look at the sugar content. Many types of beef jerky sold at the store have a lot of added sugar. Try to keep it below 5 grams of sugar per serving.

Best bet: Sugar free beef jerky.

A Boiled Egg

This is the least hardy of our recommendations but unless you have to leave these snacks in your car and it’s hot outside, you don’t really have to worry about the boiled egg.

Eggs are a great source of healthy fats, vitamins and minerals and an excellent source of protein.

Our recommendation: Always keep a dozen boiled eggs in the refrigerator. They are great snacks at any time!

Stay away from those…

Those little packets of 100 calorie snacks should be avoided by most people, especially type 2 diabetics. They are little more than sugar-spiking food products. It does not matter that they contain only 100 calories. It matters that they consist of some type of flour and sugar, both of which spike your blood sugar. Who thinks it’s better to eat a 100 calorie pack of cookies over one triple-double-stuffed Oreo cookie, which is also 100 calories?

That is insane

These snacks help you better control your blood sugar

While the 100 calorie snack packs are insane, these three snacks are not. Eat them when hungry. Your blood sugar will thank you!

If you liked these tips and would like more, sign up for our email newsletter below.

Purpose of the Webinar: Stress the importance of improving insulin sensitivity, which is not done by conventional treatment methods.

As mentioned during the webinar, we have an offer to enroll for an exclusive discount of $150 off.

If you’d like to enroll, get access to all 10 Modules of the HPI Diabetes Academy, all of our webinars and more, click the image below to be taken to our shopping cart where you can enroll right now and get immediate access to our website!

Here is how the process will work:

When you click the link below, you will be taken to our shopping cart. Once your transaction is complete, you will be automatically taken to the “Account Creation” page for the HPI Diabetes Academy website. From that point, all you have to do is create your account and you are registered and enrolled!

“Discordance exists between the research evidence and academic and clinical policy statements about the value of tight glycemic control to reduce micro- and macrovascular complications.”

In other words, what type 2 diabetic patients are being told about controlling their blood sugar and it reducing their risk for kidney disorders, vision problems or pain-related issues, is not consistent with the research.

In fact…

“This evidence reported no significant impact of tight glycemic control on the risk of dialysis/transplantation/renal death, blindness or neuropathy. …however, most published statements and guidelines unequivocally endorsed” the benefits.

So we have a conundrum…

Not really. There are at least three issues here

One off blood tests indicate nothing

When we visit the doctor and have a fasting blood sugar test done, it indicates almost nothing regarding blood sugar control. A step in the right direction would be to monitor blood sugar control with regular A1c tests.

Wholly invested in controlling blood sugar

Everything we do regarding treatment of type 2 diabetes and/or prediabetes (a terrible term) is geared to control blood sugar – we’ve built the entire industry around it. Whether it be the medication, a fasting blood sugar test, or “official statements” from AHA, CDC, NIH or the ADA, it’s all about controlling blood sugar and reducing risk.

This leads to zero positive impact on the cause of type 2 diabetes – insulin resistance.

Maybe type 2 diabetes really is an insidious condition

It is quite possible that insulin resistance and blood sugar dysregulation are more complicated than we currently think and/or know.

It is amusing, telling and disturbing when a complicated concept is taken to a point where it is too simple – simple beyond reason.

But…if the risk for these complications in type 2 diabetics is higher, it means those without type 2 diabetes have a lower risk. So it plays some role – maybe we don’t really understand if the risk is causative or associative. But the risk is there.

So what should you do?

First, understand and come to grips with the fact that artificially controlling your blood sugar (in other words, through medication) is not enough. In spite of what your healthcare professional(s) tell you, the evidence simply does not support it.

Second, take steps to improve insulin sensitivity, which will decrease insulin resistance. Some of these steps include the right diet, proper exercise and ensuring enough sleep (I recently hosted a live webinar on these very topics. If you’d like to view it, enter your name and email address below).

If you can improve insulin sensitivity, you make progress on naturally controlling blood sugar – as opposed to artificially. The more consistent you are, the more your insulin sensitivity improves. The more it improves, the more your body starts acting like someone who doesn’t have type 2 diabetes.

View the Webinar

What they aren’t telling you!

As a type 2 diabetic, you are keenly aware of the importance in controlling your blood sugar. Whether it is with your diet, the frequency or dosage of your medication, this point is hammered home!

But there is something they aren’t telling you.

Everything you are instructed to do is to control blood sugar:

Medication? Find the right dose so the numbers are where they like them?

Diet? These are the exchanges. Use them, but eat fewer calories.

Exercise? Go burn some of those calories you just ate!

This is nonsense.

It’s nonsense because…

Controlling blood sugar will not fix anything. Sure, you want to keep your blood sugar in check and taking your medication will help you do that. But…type 2 diabetes (and prediabetes) is a problem of insulin resistance. You’ve been told that before, right?

Insulin resistance is what causes your blood sugar to rise. Taking medication to control your blood sugar does nothing to improve insulin resistance!

So you take your medication and check your “numbers.” But what happens when your medication runs out? You need a refill or your blood sugar goes back up. Right?

This is the problem!

In order to improve your health and control your condition, you need to improve insulin sensitivity. This will allow your body to deal with the elevated blood sugar naturally, as opposed to doing it artificially with medication.

So how do you do that?

The Metabolic Problem

Outside of the obvious, type 2 diabetics are fundamentally different than non-diabetics when it comes to their metabolism. For example, at rest they burn a significantly higher amount of carbohydrates to produce calories than their non-diabetic counterparts. This is a major problem because we should all be burning fat while at rest. This holds true as they exercise – they burn a significantly lower percentage of calories from fat at all levels of exercise intensity. Beyond the metabolic and exercise differences, they have a hard time dealing with hunger and feeling satisfied because of this metabolic problem.

This is why the standard approach doesn’t work.

When you combine this with the above information – medication that controls blood sugar doesn’t improve insulin sensitivity – it is no wonder that average type 2 diabetic is told they will never be able to get off of their medication. Nothing is done to properly help them.

Improving Insulin Sensitivity is Key

There are three ways a type 2 diabetic can improve insulin sensitivity:

Proper diet

Proper exercise

The right amount of sleep

I know. Very groundbreaking, right?

But something in this list is key: The word proper! Because if the right kind of food is not eaten, the right kind of exercise is not done and if the right amount of sleep is not part of the equation, insulin sensitivity will not improve.

Proper Diet

The diet for a type 2 diabetic should do at least two things: 1) reduce the overall glucose load on the body. This will help reduce fat storage and help the liver better regulate circulating blood glucose (one of its many important functions). 2) It should promote a fat-burning state so that while at rest, a type 2 diabetic can decrease the amount of carbohydrates their body is burning. Did you even realize you could do this with the proper food choices?

Proper Exercise

Any kind of exercise is better than no exercise, but when it comes to a type 2 diabetic, some exercise is superior. Exercise that promotes fat-burning should serve as the bulk of physical activity. It is like a sledgehammer, battering your metabolism into submission and forcing it to get better at burning fat. Note: This will also help with the resting metabolism problem. So it has a nice side benefit. Another thing to mention: This type of activity should be continuous and last more than 30 minutes – with an hour being optimal. Why? Because it takes a while for your body to get into a good fat burning zone. You need to get in that zone and then stay there.

The right amount of sleep

A lack of quality sleep is associated with every chronic condition known to man. Type 2 diabetes is no different. Further, most people don’t necessarily need to go to bed earlier to improve the quality of their sleep. They just need to change a few things in the last hour or so before they go to bed. After a good dinner the night before and a good night’s sleep, your metabolism is just about perfect.

Start doing these things

If you start doing these things, your insulin sensitivity will improve. Your body will start controlling blood sugar naturally, like it is supposed to do.

The longer you do this, the more your insulin sensitivity will improve, which means in the long run, you won’t have to panic if/when your medication runs out.

If you’d like to learn more…

I recently hosted a webinar on these very topics.

If you’d like to view a recorded version of the webinar, enter your name and email address below and we will send it to you right away.

What happens to the carbohydrates we eat?

But did you know that understanding what happens to blood sugar is also important? I’m not talking about whether it goes up or down after you eat a meal or snack. I’m talking about after the meal and after it has reached its peak – when it starts to go down. The blood sugar goes somewhere. Do you know where it goes?

If you don’t, you should. Because knowing this will help you understand the fate of blood sugar, how you can eat to change this and what impact it will have.

Setting the Stage

It is necessary to define a key term before explaining this process and the image above.

That key term is: digestible carbohydrate. Digestible carbohydrate is the amount of carbohydrate digested by your body after eating a food. For example, one cup of zucchini contains about 12 calories (3 grams) of digestible carbohydrate. By comparison, 1 cup of diced potato contains 28 grams of carbohydrate or 112 calories from carbohydrate. However, it contains only 96 calories of digestible carbohydrate. For most foods, the difference between total carbohydrates and digestible carbohydrate is the difference in fiber content.

In both instances (and all instances of eating food) our body must deal with the digestible carbohydrate calories from the food we eat. In the explanation below, it does not matter where those carbohydrate calories come from (zucchini, potato, cake or ice cream) – the principle is still the same.

The Fate of Blood Sugar

When we eat the zucchini or potato or drink a sugary beverage, there are two outcomes for blood sugar (at least as they relate to this article): 1) some of the blood sugar will be consumed by the body to produce energy; and, 2) the rest will be stored.

The first one is easy to understand. When we eat (or drink) something, our body has to digest it. The act of digesting food is work for the body. Work for the body is done by “burning” or “producing” calories. Glucose can be used to “burn” or “produce” energy needed to do this work. So some of the blood glucose from the foods you eat will be consumed for energy production. But, depending on your circumstance and the amount of digestible carbohydrate you consumed, it is a relatively small amount. This means the rest of the blood glucose needs to be dealt with.

So what happens to the rest?

It gets stored and this is important for you to understand! There isn’t much we can do – one way or the other – to impact the amount of blood sugar that is consumed for energy production. Changing foods we eat, various combinations, whatever the case may be, there isn’t a significant change in the amount of glucose consumed during the digestive process. So this amount (whatever it may be) is pretty stable.

But we can have an impact on storage.

If you return to the image above, there is a cupcake and eggplant on the left hand side. The digestible portion of carbohydrate, that which doesn’t get consumed during the digestive process, gets stored as either glycogen or fat tissue. That’s what the arrows represent.

But how do we know what amounts goes into each and what can do to impact this?

Great questions!

First, our body would prefer to convert glucose to glycogen – the storage form of glucose. The remaining glucose, whatever doesn’t get consumed by producing energy, goes through step 1. This involves converting the glucose to glycogen and storing it – in either muscle tissue or the liver (the only real places our body can store glycogen). Step 1 continues until a condition is met: 1) Our body runs out of glucose that needs to be stored. If this happens, the process stops. Blood sugar is at “normal” levels and nothing else needs to be done. Or, 2) Glycogen levels in both the liver and muscle tissue are full and unable to accept more glycogen. When our body reaches this point, we go to step 2. Step 2 is converting glucose to fat and storing it in the fat tissue. We go through this step until blood sugar is “normal” and nothing else needs to be done.

Limiting Fat Storage

If you go back and look at the image, we can see the middle section (glycogen) dictates how much glucose gets converted to fat and stored in the fat tissue.

With that in mind, there are two things we can do to effectively minimize the amount of glucose that is converted to fat and stored in the fat tissue.

First, we can increase the storage capacity of glycogen. We can do this in one of two ways. By depleting our glycogen stores through dietary changes or exercise; or, by increasing the amount of muscle tissue on our body. Both of these strategies will work to increase the amount of digestible carbohydrate that gets stored as glycogen and decrease the amount of glucose that gets converted to fat and stored as fat tissue.

The second thing we can do is limit the amount of digestible carbohydrate we eat. Overall, the less digestible carbohydrate we consume, the less there is to convert to fat and store in fat tissue.

Both of these strategies will work to decrease fat storage. As an added benefit, it will also improve the body’s ability to access the fat stores, which helps improve insulin sensitivity. A positive outcome for type 2 diabetics.

Digestible Carbohydrate is an important concept to understand

Overall, as a type 2 diabetic, knowing how certain foods spike your blood sugar is important. However, knowing what happens to the digestible carbohydrate may be even more important to know.

Since we can eat foods that decrease (or limit) fat storage, we can impact our overall blood sugar. This will work to improve insulin sensitivity, so that we can control our blood sugar more naturally – instead of using medication to do it. Beyond all that, none of us like storing body fat – we don’t like the way too much of it makes us feel or look, but the negative impact it has on insulin sensitivity makes it worse.

Understanding this and acting accordingly will have a positive impact on your condition.